The Sailors Cross

[drjbrennan]

Some friends told me of a knot tyer in the Liverpool Maritime museum, showing them a knot called a 'Sailors Cross'
ABOK has one, 2419, but it doesn't seem impressive enough to be the knot my friends remember. Any ideas as to what it might have been?
It can't have been too complicated, because he tied it in front of them.

[bazz]

Merry Xmas dr j,

You can find instructions for tying the Sailors Coss in a little booklet by the late Brian Field, called  "Concearning Crosses".
This little booklet is available through the IGKT Supplies Secretary for the massive price of £2.00,   Lol.

This booklet shows the standard Sailors cross made with two strands doubled to make a four strand French sennit.

The booklet also includes 6 other cross designs.
Well worth owning a copy.

I have seen this pattern somewhere on the net but cannot remember at this time, but I would recoment supporting the IGKT and buying a copy, in fact I would recomend buying a copy of all of the guilds publications, they are all worth having for reference and ideas

I hope this is of help to you.

Take care,
Barry

[Willeke]

The knottyer in the museum may well have been Dave Walker, he is their regular knot man. So, if you can not work it out, we might ask him.

Willeke

[drjbrennan]

I will follow up those suggestions, but during my search I found this, I thought it very interesting.

http://www.agacorrea.com/aga/cgi-bin/aga.pl

[KnotNow!]

Hi, Brian's phamplet is wonderful and concerning even more crosses you might visit <www.khww.net> and look at the turks' head cross tutorials there.  These make three dimentional 4 Bight and 6 Bight crosses designed by Patrick Ducey.  Also Hensel and Gramount "Complete Encyclopedia of Knots" has several flat crossses.  You can also derive your own complex patterns by makeing sections of sinnet and then using them to help you to see how the junctions would have to be.  Some might not end up as one strand but others would.  Several back issues of Knotting Matters have crosses in the gallery from which you could catch some ideas.  I am sorry to not have an index so would have to flip through... maybe some other memeber knows which back issues.

[KnotNow!]

I climbed into my rigging loft and "stole" a copy of crosses from our IGKTPAB supplies.   Brian Field's wee book has a "sailors cross" as I thought it did.  7 crosses.  It is a happy coincidence that I just got my shipment of very hard twisted #120 cotton from Marty Combs.   By the dawn there will be sailors crosses all over the place!  I still have several spare copies to sell and Marty is now my main supplier of wonderful cord.   I was showing a fellow knotter some century old hammoc clews in #120 and the stuff I just got from Marty is the equal.  We work with what comes but this is the best in my 60 years (sorry 55 years of knotting... 60 years of living).  Visit Marty.  As soon as I get the crosses down in #120 I'll be making them in that 7mm I got.  Anyone interested please Email me.  7mm at the price of para cord.  

[KnotNow!]

Hi, Having a wonderful visit with the "Sailors Cross" from Brian Fields booklet.  Working it "in hand" is great fun and I can see how with a bit of time in working at it you could then do it in a few seconds.  These are very nice knots to "show off " with and I'll be adding this to my show list, although I'd only touched on it in passing until this post.  The non-knotting public is easily turned off by "experts" who want to show superior skill and then keep it to themselves  ... but they are easily entranced by humble skill.  I really enjoy some of the complex knots that are very easy but look very hard.  Then I can get the passerby to try the knot and find that they are the "expert" in just a few seconds.  So, with no disrespect to anyone, I think I can present the "sailors cross" and then have the visitor going away with the skill to tie it and a new bond to knotting.
 I'll be tying it in my sleep.  Good night.
 Oh, by the way.. Happy New Year to all.

[PatDucey]

I realize that this knot is not the sailors cross, but it is an interesting knot on its own merit.  

http://khww.net/modules.php?name=coppermine&file=displayimage&album=43&cat=0&pos=4

This is a Turks Head cross, it is a single piece of string tied with the tool in the background of the photo.  This is what PABPRES was refering to in his previous post.

Pat Ducey